This material event contains a "Less than Cat 3" level of radioactive material.

Event Text

AGREEMENT STATE REPORT - LOST TRITIUM EXIT SIGNS

"On October 21, 2008, Mississippi State Department of Health was notified by Rich Dailey, RSO for Wal-Mart that two (2) exit signs, each containing 11.5 Ci of H-3, were missing from the Wal-Mart store in Hernando, Mississippi. On October 27, 2008, DRH informed the RSO for Wal-Mart that the exit signs were exempt from state regulations but to send in a written notification report. The following devices were reported missing from Wal-Mart:

"The State of Mississippi was notified by a Wal-Mart corporate representative located in Bentonville, AR, indicating that Wal-Mart was unable to account for 307 tritium exit signs (which are general licensed materials) that were used at one time in Wal-Mart stores throughout the State of Mississippi. The Wal-Mart representative informed the State Office that Wal-Mart had exhausted searching for the tritium exit signs and considered them to be lost and/or missing. The State of Mississippi was provided a listing from corporate Wal-Mart of the store locations along with information on the tritium exit sign manufacturers, model and serial numbers and curie content where known. "

Notified R4DO(Farnholtz), FSME(Burgess), and ILTAB via e-mail.

THIS MATERIAL EVENT CONTAINS A "LESS THAN CAT 3" LEVEL OF RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL

Sources that are "Less than IAEA Category 3 sources," are either sources that are very unlikely to cause permanent injury to individuals or contain a very small amount of radioactive material that would not cause any permanent injury. Some of these sources, such as moisture density gauges or thickness gauges that are Category 4, the amount of unshielded radioactive material, if not safely managed or securely protected, could possibly - although it is unlikely - temporarily injure someone who handled it or were otherwise in contact with it, or who were close to it for a period of many weeks.

!!!!! THIS EVENT HAS BEEN RETRACTED. THIS EVENT HAS BEEN RETRACTED !!!!!

"AREVA NP's Richland plant wastewater effluent is continuously sampled for uranium and regulated chemicals. Chemical discharge limits are set by the City of Richland as part of the plant's Industrial Wastewater Discharge Permit. The liquid effluent 24-hour composite sample for October 13 indicated a total nitrate discharge of 1759 pounds, exceeding the daily maximum permit limit of 1300 pounds. While the laboratory analysis on the effluent sample was re-run to confirm the exceedence, the elevated discharge is inconsistent with discharge quantities that would have been predicted by either upstream process samples or nitric acid utilization, both of which would have predicted discharges in the range of slightly over 800 pounds of nitrate. Nitrate discharges for the subsequent two days (October 14 and 15) were 641 and 886 pounds nitrate, respectively.

"The October 13 permit violation (revealed via October 16 lab analysis) was reported to the City of Richland on October 17 within 24 hours of confirmation in accordance with permit requirements. Follow-up written notification was provided to NRC Region II for informational purposes in accordance with the Richland site's NRC special nuclear materials license.

"Environmental significance of this single day exceedence is low; the plant's overall daily average nitrate discharge for the month was 564 pounds, well below the applicable daily average permit limit of 1000 pounds. The City of Richland sewage treatment plant was not adversely impacted; that plant does not have a comparable limit on its nitrate discharges."

"The purpose of this correspondence is to officially retract the subject event report filed by AREVA's Richland, Washington fuel fabrication facility. The report was filed under the Concurrent Reports provision of 10 CFR 70 Appendix A in that the Richland plant had exceeded its daily nitrate sewering limit in its City of Richland industrial wastewater discharge permit, an occurrence requiring notification of the city.

"Based on subsequent discussions with inspection staff and management at NRC Region II, and consistent with reporting guidance in Section 3.2.12 of NUREG-1022, Revision 2, it has been determined that this event does not rise to the level intended for concurrent NRC Operations Center notification under 10 CFR 70 Appendix A. Accordingly, NRC Region II has requested that AREVA retract the subject report.

"Environmental significance of this single day exceedence is low; the plant's overall daily average nitrate discharge for the month was 564 pounds, well below the applicable daily average permit limit of 1000 pounds. The City of Richland sewage treatment plant was not adversely impacted; that plant does not have a comparable limit on its nitrate discharges."

The State of Utah reported that one of their licensees, Chevron USA, Inc., reported a source disconnect on a custom made Ronan level density gauge at their refinery. The gauge was located in a dry storage tank with two pressure vessels inside. The source was inside the storage tank and was retrieved by a health physics contractor. The source is currently stored at the licensee's facility in a locked storage shed, surrounded by lead bricks. The licensee is awaiting the arrival of the Ronan representative on-site. There were no excessive exposures to either workers or the public.

"Approximately 3:00 PM on December 22, 2008, Chris Crossman RSO from Chevron called to report that a Ronan Model SA-4 source holder containing a Cesium-137 source with approximately 100 mCi (s/n: 2231 CM) became unattached from a belt that the source holder was clamped to and fell to the ground and landed inside the storage silo it was mounted to.

"Upon discovery, the RSO was notified and the area was immediately cordoned off, and perimeter access was maintained. A service licensee was called to the facility to perform surveys of the area and retrieve the source. The source was sequestered and placed into a lead brick cave in a secured storage shed on the licensee's premises. Ronan Engineering, who built this custom device for Chevron, has been contacted and they indicated that they will be out sometime after the first of the year to re-install the source.

"On January 13, 2009, a reciprocity inspection and investigation by the Utah DRC was performed at the Chevron Refinery with a Ronan representative, [DELETED], and [DELETED] the Chevron instrument technician who initially reported the incident.

"The source holder is comprised of an 18 inch stainless steel rod with a clamp at one end. This clamp, the 'tape grabber,' clamps to the end of a guide belt. Over the clamp is a stainless steel threaded sleeve, held in place with a small tension screw. At the opposite end of the source rod is the Cs-137 source mounted inside the stainless steel rod. Over the source is a cylindrical collimator which can open to fine tune the exposure field. The source rod is mounted inside a dry 'guide tube' that is raised and lowered inside the tank, via an electronic pulley mechanism. The pulley also controls in tandem, at the same level as the source, a detector mounted on the outside of the tank, also in a dry guide tube.

"By using a dummy source holder for comparison, the source holder and clamp were briefly examined while inside the lead cave. The source holder was found intact and a previously done leak test indicated no leakage from the source. Closer scrutiny of the clamp end (the Tape Grabber) revealed that the set screw that holds the tape grabber together had partially loosened. Furthermore, small tension screw that holds the outer sleeve in place had worked itself loose and somehow sheared off. With the inner screw loose and the outer screw the weight of the source holder is all that was needed to pull the guide belt out of the clamp.

"Root Cause: Failure of equipment to perform as designed. Poor design and testing of design contributed to the failure of this device.

"Corrective Actions: The licensee called Rocky Mountain Health Physics [RMHP] who came out and relocated the source and source holder to a secure storage shed on the licensee's premises. The area where the source had fallen was roped off and all personnel in the immediate area were escorted away. RMHP wipe tested the source holder and there was no evidence of a leaking source. The licensee then called Ronan Engineering to report the failure of the device and Ronan indicated they would send a representative to the refinery in January 2009."

"On 1-15-09, DRH was notified by the Forrest County ERC that JANX Integrity Group had an accident with one of their darkroom trucks off Hwy 59 N., in Hattiesburg, MS. The driver for JANX struck a tree off the side of the interstate causing the vehicle to catch fire. The driver then left the scene of the accident. The radiography camera, SPEC-150, SN 150 (Ir-192, 65 Ci), was not discovered until the fire department saw a 'Caution Radiation Area' sign in the bed of the darkroom truck after extinguishing the fire. Surveys were conducted by firefighter personnel for their safety and to pinpoint the location of the radioactive device in the darkroom truck. The Forrest County ERC contacted an industrial radiography company and MS Licensee located in Hattiesburg to take possession of the camera and secure it in their storage vault. The radiography camera was retrieved off the darkroom truck and out of its locked storage box by the MS Licensee. The radiography camera was surveyed by the MS Licensee before being transported to their storage facility. On 1-15-09, JANX retrieved the radiography camera out of storage for transport back to the manufacturer to assess the damage.

"DRH took surveys of the darkroom truck and the radiography camera. Radiation measurements were as follows: 24 mR/hr at the surface of the camera; 4 mR/hr at 6 inches from the camera; levels were background at the vehicle. DRH coordinated the receipt of radiography camera between JANX and a MS licensee for delivery back to the manufacturer."

LOSS OF CONTROL ROOM AIR CONDITIONING AND EMERGENCY VENTILATION SYSTEM

"At approximately 1300 hours on January 21, 2009, a loss of control air to the Control Room ventilation system occurred. As a result, the three Control Room Air Conditioning subsystems required by Technical Specification (TS) 3.7.4, 'Control Room Air Conditioning (AC) System,' and the two Control Room Emergency Ventilation subsystems required by TS 3.7.3, 'Control Room Emergency Ventilation (CREV) System,' became inoperable. As a result, this condition could have prevented the fulfillment of the safety function for these systems. Because Brunswick has a shared control room, Unit 1 and Unit 2 entered TS 3.7.3 Required Action B.1, for two CREV subsystems inoperable (i.e. be in Mode 3 within 12 hours) and TS 3.7.4, Required Action E.1, for three Control Room AC subsystems inoperable (i.e. enter LCO 3.0.3 immediately). Operability of the Control Room AC subsystems and CREV subsystems was restored and related LCO's including TS 3.0.3 were exited at 1429 hours following the restoration of control air to the Control Room ventilation systems.

"No power reduction took place as a result of the LCO 3.0.3 entry. This report applies to both Units 1 and 2 and is being made in accordance with 10 CFR 50.72(b)(3)(v)(D), as a condition that at the time of discovery could have prevented fulfillment of the safety function of systems that are needed to mitigate the consequences of an accident.

"The safety significance of this event is considered minimal. The condition existed for approximately 1 hour and 29 minutes. Plant staff took immediate action to return the equipment to service. For the brief time the Control Room AC and CREV systems were inoperable, performance of plant personnel and equipment in the Control Room was not adversely affected.

"The control air to the Control Room ventilation systems has been restored to service. This allowed restarting the Control Room air conditioning units. Both CREV trains and the three Control Room air conditioning units have been restored to operable. TS 3.7.3 and TS 3.7.4 Actions have been exited."